Research Week #5 - Emboar, Muk, Meganium, Pelipper

NU is a tier where many Pokemon are usable, and there are a ton of different options. Research Week aids in helping explore the tier, and is especially effective right now as NU is relatively balanced. Who knows, maybe in future tier changes one of these Pokemon can be incredibly useful, potentially being able to check the new threats well. Maybe one of these Pokemon may find uses in other tiers and is not just a simple throw-away Pokemon, unlike some unfortunate Pokemon in NU.

Some rules:
-Be open-minded, don't just say something is terrible and walk away; at least look into them and see what options they may be able to utilize!
-Feel free to theorymon, but make it clear that you are theorymon'ing. At the end of the week, however, I want discussion to move towards how useful the Pokemon actually are in NU, and what sets are effective on them.
-Just because an analysis has been done for a Pokemon doesn't mean there isn't more to explore; it's quite possible that something might have gone unnoticed or is missing.
-Do not post in this thread complaining about the Pokemon I choose and/or suggesting ones we should do for future weeks. I want discussion to stay on topic about the 4 Pokemon we are "researching". Feel free to VM / PM me these suggestions, but don't expect the next research week to have all the Pokemon you suggested, or any of them.

Anyways, the 4 Pokemon we will be looking into for this Research Week are:

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How useful are these Pokemon in NU? What sets can they run effectively? What gives them trouble? What advantages do they have over other Pokemon?

Discuss; I can't wait to see the discussion that comes out of this! Don't forget you're not just limited to this topic to discuss these Pokemon, I encourage you to talk about them on the #neverused irc chat as well! At the end of the week I hope we can reach a general consensus on how good these Pokemon really are, and maybe we might find some interesting discoveries.

Just posting because Pelipper is easily my favorite mon of all time. I used it in OU for kicks awhile back on a rain team where I ran him as a sort of mini-tornadus. If I remember correctly the set was something like:

It was actually pretty cool, getting powered-up hydro pumps, and 100% accurate hurricanes, while also healing off some of the LO damage. I think the Ev's were just to outspeed standard Dnite after a DD. Obviously that's sort of irrelevant here, but it might be fun to use down here as apposed to the defensive roosting version . It certainly has the "Surprise!" factor going for it. In conclusion I love Pelipper he is really cool.

Emboar's a pretty cool guy, and he's definitely not as outclassed by Magmortar as people think. Yes, he's slower, but he gets neutrality to SR, resistance to Sucker Punch, the ability to hit both Quagsire and Altaria simultaneously, and STAB Fighting attacks. I used a Fire Blast / Superpower / Grass Knot / HP Ice set with 252 Atk / 252 SpA Rash and Thunder Wave support, and it was very effective. Rash Emboar is almost as powerful as Timid Magmortar, and gets the vastly superior STAB Superpower over Focus Blast. Emboar's also a beast under Trick Room, for obvious reasons.

The speed ev's are so that Muk can outspeed uninvested Tangela while the hp helps it make 101 hp subs. Gunk Shot is way more powerful than Poison Jab, but if you don't want to lose because of a miss, Poision Jab is an alternative. Shadow Sneak can probably be replaced for a coverage move since it doesn't even KO Kadabra.

Muk has amazing bulk on the special side and allows it to survive even Magmortar Fire Blasts and unboosted Psychics. Special attackers without a super-effective attack such as Haunter have a lot of difficulty getting past Muk.

Meganium's main issue is distinguishing itself from Vileplume as a cleric. At first glance, Vileplume seems to take the cake thanks to the ability to remove Toxic Spikes, STAB Sludge Bomb and Sleep Powder. Vileplume also has Stun Spore, while Meganium has to work with the less reliable Body Slam.

On the other hand, Meganium has access to Screens, Earthquake to hammer Fire-types, better overall bulk, Leech Seed, and Dragon Tail.

I think its funny how well these specific pokes can work well together. Muk&Emboar don't like ground and psychic attacks which meganium and pelipper don't mind. Vice versa with the weaknesses of meganium and pelipper.

I haven't used Pelipper too extensively, but I already know it can abuse stuff like specs, life orb, wide lens, lefties+rain dish in rain, etc.

Today I have made a team using this 4 Pokemon and laddered a bit.
It was funny. I used a team of SpecsPelipper/SubLO Emboar/SubCurseMuk/SpecialDefMeganium/Garbodor/CB Lairon and I was surprised how well the team did.

As for emboar I can only say that it is quite a strong Pokemon with stallbreaking abilitys and it can be a threat to any team when the right Pokemon are removed. Spikes + Scarfemboar for example can destroy teams on it's own, while you can use a mixed Sub set to break stall. Or just a CB set as a wallbreaker. It has a huge amount of sets it can run and it's variety can win you a game. It's a pity that it's that slow. I have never tried a specs set but it might be funny. Emboar is a great pokemon that gets a checked a bit too easy to be in a higher tier than NU.

This was the set I was using and I must say it's ok. It swept a few times but usually it just killed something in midgame and then got revenge killed. 404 HP subs are cool bur I never really needed them to be honest. max special def because it's bulky as hell and others into def because bulk is always good. Curse to boost, poison jab for stab and sub to havae a sub and help focus punches. most walls can't break the sub so it's ok. I don't know what other sets this can be running besides a resttalk wall set. Muk is a decent pokemon but it is nothing special and NU for a reason.

A wall meganium is ok as a well but not more. It does barely anything besides cleric'ing once and then being dead against offensive teams. And stall in NU is not that common so it's not really usefull in todays meta. Once I ran a specsset but it didn't had the power I wanted. Out of those 4 Meganium is by far the worst. It gets SD but I doubt that it can use it properly. Don't know what else to say about it.

Now the star of the show. SpecsPelipper is hilariously good. It caused so many ggs and killed so many pokemon. 48 Speed to outspeed 4 Evs base 70 Pokemon max special attack because modest + specs hits hard and others into HP. I love this Pokemon. You come into anything you ressist and if the opponent doesn't have Cryognal or an very good special wall something is going to die. It does nearly 80% to common Duosion and OHKO's stuff like Sawk. He makes a great offensive core with Lairon because they basicly break anywall and everything that walls Pelipper is a switch in for Lairon and same for Lairon-walling-Pokemon. I love the fact that people underestimate it's power.

Other than that Pelipper can run sets like a physical wall but that is just outclassed. I haven't tried a rain dance set but I can imagine that it's quite good. Gotta love Pelipper I will make a serious team with Pelipper + Lairon core.

I feel like Pelipper and Stunfisk would work really well together. Simple rest-talk with discharge for fisk to spread paralysis, and a LO Rain set for Pelipper to get its perfect coverage on the tier while healing with Rain Dish...

Emboar i've tried before, and it's very powerful. Just don't expect it to eliminate more than one or two of teh opponent's pokemon because of its mediocre bulk and use of recoil moves. It's better mixed or choiced, but it's definitely a great pokemon.

Meganium would be better if Poison-typing weren't actually a good thing to absorb toxic spikes. However, as a bulky grass without a weakness to Psychic, it's very useful. aromatherapy, synthesis, and dragon tail are its niches, and if you need a grass that doesn't suck after its item has been knocked off, then meganium is good.

Muk seems very linear, I haven't tested it much but it seems like all it can ever do is curse or subpunch, which are both fairly easily walled or set up on...

^ well, perfect neutral coverage in his stabs, better physical bulk, and longevity from rain dish and roost, i would imagine.

i've tinkered with the first three a fair amount, and they all are quite usable imo. emboar hits like a tank, though i agree that he dies awfully fast. still, the most he's doing imo is scarf/band, with grass knot as a cool utility for quag. i am a fan of muk, he's just sorta a bro. tspikes are annoyingly popular, so i'm basically running him quite a lot. sub-punch, as one-dimensional as it may be, is pretty stupid effective, though the surge in marowaks has been a pain for it :/ notwithstanding, he's still more than usable, which is pretty awesome imo. pelipper is pretty neat, basically a bulkier, slower swanna. the lack of speed+viable brave bird for breaking cryo is kinda a pain, but he makes a much better switch-in to sawk, so its a decent give-and-take.

NU Co-Leader

I've hyped up Muk's CB set quite a bit, its incredibly hard to switch in to, bulky and has priority. Pelipper I find being outclassed by Swanna, who is faster and stronger. The bulk probably helps though. I have 0 experience with meganium, except i got swept by a sd one once. oh and Emboar is badass

Pelipper in Rain seems like a nice concept, but where does he fit over threats like SS Gorebyss and Seismitoad? Toad is just as strong and way faster, and Gorebyss is just ludicrously powerful.

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Water/Flying is perfectly unresisted coverage in NU, and Pelipper's special attack is not fantastic but useable because of the high power of its STAB moves. It doesn't lower its own defenses while boosting, and it has natural bulk combined with a reliable recovery move and the added bonus of Rain Dish helping negate Life Orb recoil and residual damage. LO Hurricane 1hko's Jynx after SR and 1hko's every Grass-type in the tier, and has a nice confusion chance. It's a bit like Tornadus, in that if your opponent has a pokemon that is below 65 base speed that you switch in on safely, something is going to die, since even max spdef Lickilicky is 2hko'ed by Hydro Pump, or by Hurricane followed by Hydro Pump with hazards. All of this is assuming that Rain is either put up by Pelipper or by something else, but it's definitely worth the support if you plan to use it. hurricane is really good =D

Meganium's really hard to kill without a super effective attack, so this takes a different attempt in sweeping. Clearly the EVs are quickly made, but if I had the time to build it, i would probably make it outspeed Gorebyss, put 252 HP, and take out evs from attack if necessary, and even take off that boosting nature. It's rather surprising to say the least. While it has its counters, it's probably the best offensive set Meganium can pull off.

Hey guys. I'm sorry I haven't been participating in this as much as I should, I've been focusing on other things for the past few days.

After this Research Week I plan to make it more like RU's Research Week. I need to talk it over with tennis first, but from what I can understand he's planning on doing something similar.

Anyways, on to the Pokemon.

Emboar: We all know that the Choice sets are great on Emboar, so I won't bother talking about them. My favorite Emboar sets are bulky ones with Substitutes. I'm still testing Sub Emboar out, so I don't know what the best options on it are, but I'm liking this so far:

This Emboar aims to Substitute on Pokemon such as Tangela and Lickilicky. It then proceeds to hit things with its powerful Fire Blast attack and can rip through many things with its strong attacks. I'm considering using Scald over Hammer Arm, as I tend to not use Hammer Arm much and the burn chance is very useful. It also hits Golem and a few other Pokemon harder.

Erisia's Emboar set is also pretty fun. However, it dies so quickly and isn't very fast... it really needs the paralysis support and there are other Pokemon that can abuse paralysis support really well, too. It's cool on a dedicated team, but not so great on its own.

Emboar is also effective in the sun. While it's fairly slow, with a Choice Scarf, it can do a lot of damage with just Flare Blitz. I think Magmortar is a better Fire-type sun abuser, but Emboar is a good choice for a sun team if you want another Fire-type abuser.

Muk: Muk is probably my favorite Pokemon of this research week. It's oddly bulky, and has quite a few interesting options that it can use effectively. Gunk Shot hits quite hard, especially on a Choice Band set; it misses a lot, though. The Choice Band set could just spam Gunk Shot a lot of the time -- even though it is resisted by a lot of things -- and in my opinion it's the only reason you should use Choice Band. Priority Shadow Sneak is nice too, but it is so weak thanks to it not being STAB.

Curse is one of the most hyped sets, but in my opinion, it's the least interesting. I never really found it that threatening, but it's hard to 2HKO it so it can usually kill something. It never does much else after that, though, and has trouble surviving for long periods of time.

SubPunch was my favorite set. It could set up a Substitute quite easily and was quite devastating for defensive teams. Its great bulk allowed it to tank up to 2 hits on most offensive Pokemon so it wasn't useless against offensive teams.

Pelipper: Pelipper is my least favorite out of these 4; it's just not outstanding in any way. Mediocre bulk, low Speed, not-that-great offensive stats, nothing that impressive about it. I tried a SubRoost set and it didn't work that well because it was just so weak. It didn't have much of a problem setting up a Substitute on things, but it couldn't do much damage to a lot of Pokemon. I used a rain set for a few battles, but I wasn't that impressed. There are plenty of other rain abusers out there and Pelipper didn't have that much to offer. I guess I need to try it out more, but the few battles I used it in I wasn't impressed.

Meganium: Meganium :D. It's a pretty good cleric, and unlike most clerics, it's actually quite fast. It has a good niche on Spike-stacking teams that need clerics as it can stack up hazard damage with Dragon Tail while dealing with many threats and clearing the team of status. It's a shame that Meganium really can't fit both Leech Seed and Synthesis on the same set and that it's pretty weak offensively. =/ I wonder how Earthquake would do on a cleric Meganium.

Swords Dance Meganium is the other Meganium I've seen talked about in this thread. I haven't actually tested it out yet, but it looks really interesting! It has a mix of bulk, speed and power, and it even has recovery!

Anyways, let's continue on posting! There are a few things I want to see in this thread:

More discussion on Pelipper and Meganium.

Discussion of using Meganium over other clerics; why it's better or not better.

Moderator

Pelipper isn't too bad as a back-up Rain setter, and with Rain Dish active, it should have just enough bulk to tank a physical hit and throw Hurricane and Hydro Pumps around. It's not too impressive, but it gets the job done moderately well.

Emboar's exclusive access to Heat Crash may seem like an interesting gimmick to build a team around to circumvent the recoil of the other physical fire attack, but given his relatively paltry 150 kg weight, Flare Blitz is almost always the superior option. (Heavy Slam is accessible as an egg move, but lack of STAB and worse type coverage makes that laughable.) There's a reason a lot of people stopped running Grass Knot. It also gets EdgeQuake if you want to get cute.

Like Blaziken before him, Emboar has access to good mixed attacking stats, dragged down by a lack of speed. 65 is still good enough for a scarf set, hitting 376 assuming Jolly, and Fire/Fighting does have good enough coverage that one can consider it. Being neutral to SR helps with running a scarf set as well. Heck, Emboar's physical sets hit harder than unboosted Infernape, and Roar is an interesting option given its lack of ability to boost itself. 110/65/65 defenses would be good enough to consider a Curse set if it wasn't for his bad defensive typing and the presence of Mesprit in the tier.

On the special side, Emboar's options aren't as attractive. Sure, you have Fire Blast and Focus Miss for obligatory stab, but it gets downhill from there. Scald can be a major surprise, but that move is better used by defense-oriented builds.

In the support department, Emboar has a good thing going for it by virtue of a combination of low speed and access to the combination of 101 HP Substitute and a pinch ability in Blaze. However, all it can do behind said sub is Curse. Trollfreak strikes again.

In DW, Emboar can shine a bit more with its physical sets, throwing powerful Head Smashes and Wild Charges along with Flare Blitz for huge damage alongside Reckless--add Liechi Berry for even more pain. Unless it's passed a speed boost by something like Gligar, however, don't even try to sweep with this guy.

This may be an odd question, but why would you use Curse when Emboar has Bulk Up? I can't imagine Gyro Ball is that powerful against it, and it certainly can't break its Subs.

On that note, Meganium has another move not yet mentioned that most other clerics don't: Counter. It learns Aromatherapy naturally and both are legal with Leech Seed, Dragon Tail, Screens, etc. Ampharos also has Counter, true, but Ampharos lacks any recovery. This round looks fun, if it were me I'd try a parashuffler with Body Slam / Counter / Synthesis / Dragon Tail and hazard support. If you're afraid of Fires, use EQ over Counter. Anything you end up paralyzing becomes very difficult to switch in.